Casual Date
by Kerriberri
Summary: It's not a date. It's just two colleagues coming together to rewrite a play. Nothing can go wrong...right? Originally published on Tumblr for Pewey Week 2016.


**Note: I originally published this story on Tumblr on October 20, 2015.**

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It was just a few weeks before Founder's Day in Beach City and the citizens were hard at work making preparations. With several descendants of the original townsfolk arriving soon, everyone was making sure that the town looked its best.

Especially Mayor Bill Dewey.

Ever since he became mayor, he was always very meticulous in planning this day. After all, his great-great-great-great-grandfather Captain William Dewey was the very reason for this celebration (and as many citizens knew, he never wasted an opportunity to put his name out there, even if it was under the name of his ancestor). Whatever his reason for making such a huge fuss over this day, he always took it upon himself to make it a huge success.

Until now.

"Sir, you have a visitor."

Hearing his secretary's voice snapped him out of his thoughts. He had been staring at the picture on the wall behind his desk for the past five minutes, wondering if he had finally gotten it straight, thereby ensuring that everything in his office was neat and tidy (as it should since he spent the past hour and a half making frantic readjustments of anything that appeared out of place).

He turned around to his desk and picked up his phone's receiver. "O-okay. Thank you." He said. Once he hung up the phone, he hurried over to a mirror for a quick touch-up. He straightened his tie and raked his fingers through what was left of his hair. He then ran his hands over his suit jacket to smooth out any wrinkles. Just as soon as he took out his handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his forehead, there was a knock at the door.

This was it.

He quickly blotted his face and put the handkerchief away, knowing full well that it was all in vain as he began to perspire even more. After taking a deep breath as an attempt to regain some composure, he opened the door.

"Good evening, Miss Pearl!"

"Hello, Mayor Dewey." Her smile nearly made his heart melt.

"Please, come in." He stepped out of her way and she entered his office. Closing the door behind her, he asked, "So, how are you this evening?"

"Just fine, thanks for asking." She said, taking a seat in front of his desk. "Shall we get started?"

"Huh? Oh, right! With the play!" He returned to his desk and sat down. "Of course!" Realizing that he sounded a little louder and way more eager than what he intended, he cleared his throat.

Since his—well **their**—play _Beach City or Bust: The (True) Tale of William Dewey_ went over so well, he decided to bring it back for Founder's Day; with some modifications of course. He wanted it to be more elaborate and run a bit longer, but he was not about to put pen to paper for the rewrite until he talked things over with an "inside source".

"Once again, I'd like to thank you for helping me with this play…again." He said, adding a laugh with the last word. "Now, before we begin, can I get you anything? Some coffee? Or…"

"I'm fine." She answered.

"Okay then." He looked down at his hands. "Anyway, if you'd like, I have some stuff that could help us out…with the play, that is." A nervous smile spread across his face as he opened his drawer and took out several books and albums of varying degrees of newness.

"Thank you." She said. Once he was done, she selected a particularly large photo album to examine and sat back in her chair.

He watched her as she read. Seeing just how quickly she would go a furrowed brow of close examination to seeing her eyes light up with fascination was rather endearing. She eventually sensed his stare and scowled at him, causing him to immediately look away.

Once her gaze returned to the scrapbook, he decided that he should do some research of his own and plucked a random book from the pile and opened it. At first glance, it appeared to be some type of journal or farmer's almanac. He shrugged. Surely, there had to be something useful inside.

An hour had now passed, and despite the occasional page turn and the scribbling of a pen to take notes, the two sat in otherwise complete silence. Of course, every now and again, he would ask her if she was comfortable and if there was anything he could get her, but her answers would always be "I'm fine" and "No thank you".

As a result, he contemplated just leaving the matter alone altogether, but he felt like he just had to say **something**. This project **was** supposed to a collaborative effort after all, and the quiet was beginning to feel, well…awkward.

Little did he know, the silence was beginning to bother Pearl as well.

She was becoming increasingly apprehensive and losing focus on the task at hand. From previous experiences, she knew that long periods of silence usually meant that it wouldn't be too long before something bad happened. She couldn't help but feel that any minute now, a swarm of gem creatures would invade the office, or Amethyst would burst in and taunt her about her "date".

_"Have fun on your date, P!"_

"Oh, be quiet!" She shouted over her shoulder.

"Is something wrong?"

She clamped her hand over her mouth. Surely she wasn't hearing things. Her voice was so clear! Pearl's now-widened eyes darted about the room, looking for any odd purple objects or creatures. With each passing second, she found herself coming up short. For the sake of her sanity, she was hoping to lay eyes on her lilac teammate.

"…Miss Pearl?"

Her eyes locked with his. Seeing how worried he was brought her back to reality, and she immediately looked down at her lap. A teal flush soon appeared on her face.

"I'm sorry." She apologized, twiddling and twisting her fingers. "I was just—I thought I…" She glanced back up at him and saw that he was still concerned. As her gaze went back down to her hands, she let out a nervous chuckle.

"It's just so quiet in here."

He smiled, relieved to see that she was okay. "Ha. Ha. Yeah…" Now it was his turn to blush. "Would you like for me to put on some music or something?"

Her hands became still. "Actually…" Pearl began. She looked up at him and gave him a warm smile.

"That would be nice."

The next hour and a half seemed to fly by. The stuffy, awkward silence from earlier was now replaced by humming (mostly from her) and light conversation. In between their exchanges about music, they made a little progress in their rewrite of _Beach City or Bust_.

For them, it was enough to go ahead and call it a day.

Pearl stood in the lobby as she waited for the mayor to finish closing down City Hall for the day. Once he concluded that everything was in order, he rejoined her and they walked outside together. Then, he took his keys out of his pocket to lock the door.

"Are you sure you don't want me to give you a lift home?" He asked over his shoulder. "It's really no trouble at all."

"Well…" Her voice trailed off. She pondered the offer. It was a bit chilly outside right now and the breeze made it feel even colder.

However, she decided that facing the chilly night air was just a small price to pay to avoid unrelenting teasing from Amethyst.

Along with some rather harmless jabs from Steven and Garnet.

"Thank you, but I'm fine." She said.

"Okay then…" He rubbed the back of his neck. "So…same time tomorrow?"

"It's a date."

Upon realizing what she just said, she gasped.

Not again!

"Um, I mean…" Her face was beginning to glow bright blue for the second time tonight. Before she could run away in embarrassment, he grabbed her hands.

No sooner than she looked at him, his gaze went to the ground, suggesting that he was just as surprised by his reaction as she was. In fact, he was blushing just as much as (if not even more than) she was. He gave her hands a light squeeze and looked up at her with a smile.

"I'll see you at five."

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**Hey, guys, I hope you enjoyed this story. I have more stories from Pewey Week 2016, so let me know if you'd be interested in reading them.**


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